Penn's chapter of the American Association of University Professors offered recommendations to the Presidential Commission on Countering Hate and Building Community last week.
In the April 12 meeting, the AAUP Executive Committee brought forth several recommendations centered around academic freedom and the role of faculty governance. They outlined their recommendations, “based on the discussions in [their] membership meetings this year,” in a statement released by AAUP-Penn later that day.
The suggestions brought forth by the AAUP Executive Committee include the creation of a “legitimate and effective mechanism for enforcing the Guidelines on Open Expression,” and the enforcement of University “policies protecting academic freedom.”
A University spokesperson declined to comment.
They also suggested that the Faculty Handbook be amended to protect “intramural and extramural speech,” and that University administrators should “publicly denounce the targeted harassment of members of the university.” Other recommendations were centered around faculty's role in shared governance at the University.
“[T]he Faculty Senate must be transformed into a governing institution,” the statement read. “At present, its rules restrict it to serving an advisory function. This is inconsistent with the principle of shared governance.”
The Executive Committee also suggested that the University should “equalize conditions” surrounding the benefits for non-tenure and tenure-track faculty.
“Today, the majority of Penn faculty are employed in non-tenure-track positions,” AAUP-Penn wrote. “It is an intolerable expression of disrespect, a threat to academic freedom for all faculty, and a threat to the quality of research and teaching to force the majority of faculty members to work in conditions of precarity.”
According to a University website, the Presidential Commission is tasked with a “goal of better supporting a Penn community that leads with care and compassion,” while addressing the “interconnectedness of antisemitism, Islamophobia, and other forms of hate, discrimination, and bias on campus."
Over the course of the academic year, AAUP-Penn has released several statements related to controversies on and off campus.
In October of last year, AAUP-Penn said that fundamental academic functionings have been "impaired" by administrators and donors' response to the ongoing violence in Gaza and Israel and the Palestine Writes Literature Festival.
Over 100 Penn affiliates then gathered in January for an AAUP-led protest for academic freedom.
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